Introduction
How did the pandemic affect the line-up of the Lowlands festival? In
this portfolio, the line-up of the 2019 and 2022 edition will be
compared. As a regular attendee I wondered what would have changed. I
will mainly look at how the music changed. Did it become sadder?
Happier? Faster? Louder?!
I expect the music to be faster, as
this was the trend, partly powered by TikTok. I am curious if the
sentiment also changed, if people felt more drawn to happier or sadder
music. I expect happier, as the vibe at the festival was very good.
There are some limitations to keep in mind. Both of the playlists
contain 100 songs that the organizer feels are representative of the
line-up of the festival, the songs played at the festival obviously
could have been different. The playlists are a proxy for this and the
conclusions drawn have limited validity.
Row
Visualizations
How did the sentiment change?
A need for happy or sad songs after the pandemic? The mean of both charts appears similar, but the second half of the 2022 chart is definitely bigger, indicating songs with more valence, in other words, more positive, happier song.
Did it get faster?
It did not get significantly faster in 2022.
Did it get more danceable?
2022 was as danceable as 2019.
Did it get more energy?
The energy decreased a tiny bit in the 2022 line-up.
Did it get louder!?
It did get a tiny bit louder!
Chromagram
From the track In Silence by Amelie Lens, techno. I chose this track as I was curious to what this high energy techno track would produce. The chart is more yellow than I expected, although it should not surprise much as it is a very overwhelming track.
Self similarity
Again the track In Silence by Amelie Lens. I chose this track as I was curious to the patterns that a techno track would produce. Indeed, repetitive.
Chordogram
From the song Marea (we’ve lost dancing) by Fred again.. and the
Blessed Madonna. I chose this song, because it has a lot of energy and I
expected to see a lot of tones, I did.
Clusters
The clusters in the 2019 playlist (top). There is just one big cluster, that gets smaller every step. This could mean the playlist is very diverse. The same patterns is visible in the 2022 playlist (bottom).
Tempogram
Tempograms are my favourite, as someone who finds keeping the beat a challenge. I chose this tempogram, because it is from the song “Ik wil dansen” by Froukje, but the tempogram shows that the beat varies a bit.
Conclusion
The music did not turn out to be faster, that assumption was wrong. In the valence chart it was however clear that the songs overall were more positive, that assumption was true. Besides the valence, a lot of statistics like loudness, energy and danceability were stable. It is nice to see the stability of these factors. I am looking forward to the full line-up of the 2023 edition to see if the preference for happier music is also present there.